Beijing opera, still referred to by many English-speakers as Peking opera, is one of the most highly developed and best known of Chinese opera forms both in China and abroad. Before the 20th century, Beijing opera was not commonly performed outside of Beijing and a few other centres. Its enormous popularity in the early 20th century, however, carried it to the status of ‘national opera’.
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Following a long-observed custom of including opera in birthday celebrations, opera troupes from around China poured into the capital to take part in the celebrations for the Qianlong Emperor's 80th birthday in 1790. Among the theatrical participants were troupes from Anhui province in central-eastern China, who specialized in the performance of the xipi and erhuang music. Xipi and erhuang came to form the core of Beijing opera music, and it is believed that 1790 marks the first time that they were heard together in Beijing. Historians, therefore, take this year to represent the beginnings of Beijing opera. It was many years, however, before the opera evolved into an independent form with its own unique identity.
Despite an official ban in 1798, the new opera prospered in Beijing. By the 1820s four of the Anhui troupes dominated the stage: the Sanqing, Chuntai, Sixi and Hechun. Two of these, the Chuntai and Sixi, survived until the Boxer uprising in 1900.
Before 1860, the imperial court scorned Beijing opera as a vulgar entertainment, but in July of that year both the Sanqing and Sixi companies were invited to perform at the palace on the occasion of the Xianfeng Emperor's 30th birthday. This event indicates that in spite of its status as a lowly form of popular entertainment, some members of the imperial family were quite fond of Beijing opera. For various reasons, troupes from outside the palace did not appear at court again until the celebration of the dowager empress Cixi's 50th birthday in 1884. While her role in China's general history is typically viewed unfavourably, the dowager empress's contribution to the development of Beijing opera was enormous. Before her reign, most opera at court was performed by special companies that rarely performed outside the palaces. From 1884 to 1910, actors from the city frequently visited the palace, and some actors even took up residence at court, where they taught and performed. Imperial patronage raised the status of Beijing opera in society as a whole.
The early decades of the 20th century may be considered Beijing opera's golden age, with the art form being one of the most pervasive and popular types of entertainment in China. Until the outbreak of war with Japan in 1937, the tradition remained extremely vital, with its practitioners actively involved in artistic experimentation and creative activity. The work of actors, musicians and librettists of the early republican period remain unsurpassed in terms of volume, innovation and longevity. Many of the schools of performance (liupai) developed during this period continue to dominate contemporary practice, and a large portion of today's standard repertory is comprised of works created during these years.
The composition of a single opera involved not only a librettist but also (of equal importance) musicians, who set the text by adapting melodies from the pihuang musical system, and actors, who were involved in shaping melodic and textual construction in addition to designing their individual choreographies. All of the major actors of the period were involved in the composition of new operas and the revision of old ones. The works they created are still identified as belonging to their school of performance. For example, the operas of four male performers of young female roles, Mei Lanfang (1894–1961; fig.2), Cheng Yanqiu (1904–58), Xun Huisheng (1900–68) and Shang Xiaoyun (1900–76), known collectively as the four famous dan (sida mingdan), continue to be widely staged and their performance styles closely imitated.
That Beijing opera held a relevant and dynamic role in society is demonstrated by the hopes of social activists, who viewed it as a potentially powerful vehicle for social and political change. The Beijing Opera Reform Movement, at its height from approximately 1908 to 1917, was just one of many such campaigns aimed at social and political reform. Activists believed that the theatre served as a classroom for the largely illiterate masses and that the most expedient way to achieve broad social change was through opera. To this end, progressive performers staged new operas called shizhuang jingju (contemporary-costume Beijing opera), the texts of which often focussed on contemporary social problems. The staging of these dramas employed realistic scenery and stage properties, and actors wore costumes based on contemporary clothing styles. The enthusiasm for this use of Beijing opera began to wane by the onset of the May Fourth Movement in 1919 as activists turned their attention away from opera and towards spoken drama.
Following changes in attitudes towards women in society at large, females began to assume roles on the stage during the early republican period. Women had hitherto been virtually excluded from the theatre, both as performers and spectators. A number of all-female troupes were active in the early 1900s, but they performed mostly at private gatherings and not in public theatres. There were a number of mixed companies throughout the 1920s and 30s, but the practice of keeping single-sex companies did not die out until after the establishment of the People's Republic of China in 1949.
Foreign tours of Beijing opera represent another milestone of the republican era. Mei Lanfang's 1930 tour to the United States gained the greatest acclaim. Mei toured more than five major cities, where his performance received rave reviews. Other early tours include Mei's 1919 and 1924 visits to Japan and his 1935 visit to the Soviet Union, as well as Cheng Yanqiu's tour to the Soviet Union, Germany, France and Italy in 1932 and 1933.
The War of Resistance against Japan (1937–45) brought a significant disruption to the performance and creation of Beijing opera. A number of China's finest artists refused to perform, and some training schools were closed. Creative teams such as that of Mei Lanfang and Qi Rushan (1877–1962), one of Mei’s most prolific librettists and artistic advisors, were broken by the circumstances of war and never reunited.
After the establishment of the People’s Republic of China, the communists reformed Beijing and other operas according to the ideology of Mao Zedong. Mao saw all art as representing the interests of a particular class and demanded that Beijing opera should serve the ‘workers, peasants and soldiers’, not the feudal aristocracy or bourgeoisie. Art should be explicit propaganda for the revolution and should help to convert the masses to socialism. To see that practice was brought in line with theory, the Ministry of Culture set up a Drama Reform Committee in July 1950. The reformers made certain changes to the texts and performance conventions to emphasize patriotism, democracy and equality between the sexes. At the same time, they developed a body of modern Beijing operas on contemporary themes.
The status of actors improved tremendously with the Communist party's efforts to eliminate institutionalized discrimination against actors, to raise their living standard and to promote the notion that theatre workers are due the same respect as other ‘brain workers’. Training methods also changed, and actors were recruited by a modern school system that included normal education in addition to instruction in the arts of the theatre.
Until 1963 traditional opera flourished, although particular patriotic or anti-feudal items enjoyed special prestige. From 1964 traditional operas virtually disappeared; during the Cultural Revolution (1966–76) they were strictly banned and replaced by ‘model operas’ (yangbanxi), the themes of which were contemporary and revolutionary, with realistic staging and costumes. After the fall of the ‘Gang of Four’ in 1976 the performance of model operas was halted, and the traditional repertory slowly reclaimed its place on the stage; in 1978 Deng Xiaoping publicly condoned the revival of traditional opera.
During the 1980s and 90s many social, political and economic forces combined to threaten Beijing opera's prospects of continuing as a living tradition. With economic reform, the state has withdrawn substantial funding from both professional companies and training schools. Box office sales are now directly responsible for a much greater portion of a company's funding than in previous decades. This change has come precisely at a time when young people's interest in the traditional arts is declining and audiences for them are growing old and dying.
Beijing opera in Taiwan experienced a significantly different history from that in mainland China. Performers who fled to the island in the late 1940s formed the foundation of Taiwan's tradition. Beijing opera's primary patron from 1949 until the mid-1990s was the Republic of China's Ministry of Defence, which operated a number of full-time troupes and training schools. The art form became known officially as ‘National Opera’ (guoju) in Taiwan, and it was more or less maintained in the ‘traditional’ pre-1949 performance style throughout the mid-1980s. As the move towards ‘Taiwanization’ has gathered strength on the island, support for mainland-derived culture has come under attack, while official patronage for Taiwan-born forms, such as Gezai opera, has increased. In 1996 the Ministry of Defence disbanded its remaining three troupes and relinquished control of its last training school. Currently there are two state-supported troupes, both under the administration of the Ministry of Education: the Guoguang Drama Troupe and the Fuxing National Opera School.
Most traditional Beijing opera music belongs to either the xipi or erhuang tune families. The combination of these two families was so integral to the opera's identity that in the past, before it was called Beijing opera (jingxi or jingju), the genre was known as pihuang opera (pihuangxi), combining the pi from xipi and the huang from erhuang. Music of other regional operas was also absorbed into Beijing opera, including melodies from kunqu and clapper opera, but pihuang music remained dominant.
Xipi and erhuang may be conceived of as modes, and together they are referred to as the pihuang musical system. While they share the same basic scale, their cadential pitches are different, as are other crucial melodic and rhythmic features. Their dramatic associations are also distinct; erhuang is typically used in serious or melancholy situations, while xipi is heard in livelier, more positive circumstances. These associations are extended to the timbre of the accompanying instruments: jinghu (bowed fiddle) with bright timbres accompany xipi, while players use a dark-sounding jinghu with a slightly larger body to accompany erhuang arias.
Both xipi and erhuang have a number of different aria types. Aria types belonging to the same family share tonal, modal and large structural features but vary in terms of metrical structure, tempo, melodic detail and specific dramatic or emotional association. One prominent theory holds that these distinct aria types were evolved from a single ‘mother’ tune. Across generations of performance, the original tunes underwent permanent and lasting changes and, over time, developed unique musical identities and were given individual names. Today, for example, the erhuang family is comprised of at least eight different aria types, including the unmetred sanban (dispersed metre) and daoban (lead-in metre), and the metred yuanban (primary metre) in a moderate 2/4 and manban (slow metre) in 4/4.
The number of pihuang aria types has been growing continually over the course of the history of Beijing opera. Since 1949 several new aria types have been created, such as the new erhuang aria types in 1/4 metre, including liushuiban (‘flowing-water metre’) and kuaiban (fast metre), and recent experiments in 3/4 metre. Since the Cultural Revolution the use of composed music that is not directly related to the pihuang musical system has become increasingly common. Often this music is purely instrumental and is used for overtures or as background music. The question of genre identity is brought into play when this music is sung and when it constitutes a large portion of an opera's music.
Purely percussive music constitutes another important kind of Beijing opera music. Percussion patterns punctuate the actors' speech and movement, provide sound effects and mark the structural divisions of an opera including its beginning, ending and scene changes.
The traditional orchestra is comprised of two main sections, the wenchang (‘civil section’) and the wuchang (‘martial section’). The core wenchang instruments are jinghu, jing erhu and yueqin. The jinghu and the jing erhu are two-string bowed lutes and belong to a family of bowed lutes known as Huqin. The jinghu has a bamboo body, whereas the jing erhu body is hexagonal and made of wood (pterocarpus); both are covered on one end in snakeskin. The timbre of the jinghu is sharp and piercing, in contrast to the more mellow and sonorous jing erhu, which is an octave lower. The jing erhu was added to the orchestra in the 1920s to complement Mei Lanfang's bright and clear voice and, in traditional performances, is only used to accompany female and young male roles. The yueqin is a plucked short-neck lute with a large round body and two to four strings. Other instruments include the suona, a conical double-reed shawm with a rosewood body and a metal bell, and the sanxian, a three-string long-necked plucked lute.
Four players form the core of the wuchang. The leader plays both the drum called danpigu and the clappers and is responsible for leading and signalling the entire ensemble. The danpigu is a small, single-headed drum that sits on a large three-legged stand and is played with bamboo sticks. A small gong, a large gong and a pair of cymbals comprise the rest of the wuchang, although other musical instruments may also be added when dramatically or musically appropriate.
The orchestra was gradually expanded after the establishment of the People’s Republic. Up to the mid-1960s, the main source of these new inclusions was China's own folk and classical instruments. During the Cultural Revolution a wide variety of Western instruments were added, including strings, oboe, french horn, trumpet and timpani. Most of these were dropped from the ensemble after the Cultural Revolution, though the cello is still frequently heard. The double bass, timpani and electric piano are also commonly employed in works written during the 1980s and 90s.
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